What Do I Do If I or Someone I Know Is Feeling Suicidal?

Having thoughts and feelings about suicide or ending your life can be very scary, confusing, and heavy. You can be having these thoughts and feelings because things in your life are overwhelming and are too painful for you to cope with. It's very normal and valid for us to feel this way when the things in life get too painful and are too much for us to handle.

Sometimes we don't feel like we can take anymore of what's going on in our life and that the only thing that will stop the pain and all of the negative emotions we are feeling is to end our life.

The most important thing you can do when you are having these thoughts or these feelings is to talk to someone you are comfortable with, someone you trust, about your thoughts and feelings about suicide or wanting to end your life and what is going on in your life that is bringing up these feelings for you. You could talk to:

• a family member

• a close friend

• a mentor

• a religious or spiritual leader

• a teacher

• your doctor

• your therapist or counselor

• an anonymous crisis counselor at the national suicide prevention lifeline (1-800-273-8255)

• or whoever you feel safe talking to.

It can be incredibly scary to talk to someone about these thoughts and feelings and you may feel ashamed, embarrassed, or guilty for feeling and thinking this way. These feelings are normal and valid too.

The person you choose to talk to might not always understand what you are feeling and what you are going through, and they might not know how to help support you. If that's the case, you may want to have them read the next section on this page to help them understand how they can best support you.

We want to acknowledge that talking about suicide is a scary and a difficult topic and that it can be hard to talk about especially if you do not understand or know what to do when someone you know is having thoughts and feelings about suicide or ending their life.

The first thing you can do when someone you know tells you that they are having these thoughts and feelings is let them know that you care about them, and that you are there for them, and will support them through these thoughts and feelings.

Language is important and you shouldn't say things like (Why do you want to kill yourself?) instead you can ask them (What is going on in your life that is bringing up these thoughts or feelings for you?)